New Order reminded of its commitment

New Order reminded of its commitment

JAKARTA (JP): As President Soeharto's New Order administration
turns 30, more people are reminding it of its original commitment
to creating an honest, just and truthful government, Gen. (ret.)
Abdul Haris Nasution said Saturday.

Nasution, affectionately known as Pak Nas, said that many New
Order government officials had breached this commitment.

"They are afraid they won't get any of the development cake,"
Pak Nas said in his address at a seminar titled Actualization of
the New Order Government's Ideals in Political and Economic
Development.

The original commitment, he argued, was waning because many
leaders were simply losing their ideals and patriotism, and were
unable to resist the temptation of corruption and collusion.

"Corruption and collusion are so widespread that (the late)
Bung Hatta described corruption as part of (Indonesian) culture,"
he said.

Mohammad Hatta and Sukarno proclaimed Indonesia's independence
on Aug. 17, 1945. Sukarno was subsequently elected president and
Hatta as vice president.

Pak Nas, 78, was an Army chief of staff and then a defense
minister under the Sukarno administration. He chaired the
Provisional People's Consultative Assembly which stripped Sukarno
of his power in 1967 and gave rise to Soeharto.

Known as a government critic, Pak Nas is also well-known as
the man who created Dwifungsi, or Dual Function doctrine, which
allows the Armed Forces a role in politics.

He reminded the seminar that the Indonesian army pledged
allegiance to the 1945 Constitution when he and Soeharto signed a
declaration on May 5, 1966.

"In the declaration, we pledged to normalize the
implementation of the Constitution, especially to uphold
democracy and respect civil rights which were restricted during
the emergency period at that time," he said.

Nasution said the eradication of social injustice should be
the government's first priority in maintaining national
stability.

He said that widening socioeconomic disparity in Indonesia
resulted from the national development program which
overemphasized the economy.

"The social gap threatens development efforts as we have
witnessed in many other developing countries. Among the
indicators of social disparity is the extent to which principles
of democracy and social justice are respected, not only
statistics (on economic development)."

Pak Nas explained how the Dwifungsi doctrine had deviated from
his original concept, which he has been questioning more and
more.

He said he created the doctrine to give members of the Armed
forces a chance to solve the state's problems by contributing
ideas to the government.

Since its conception, he said, the doctrine has changed to
justify Armed Forces members who assume civilian posts in
government, such as village chiefs, governors, regents and so
forth.

He said he practiced the original doctrine as commander of
West Java's Siliwangi military command when he asked his men to
actively seek ideas on how Indonesia should overcome its military
and sociopolitical problems.

Now in practice, what is conspicuous is not the Dwifungsi in
its original sense but its justification for the development of
extra-constitutional institutions such as Kopkamtib, he said.

Kopkamtib, or the command for restoration of security and
order, has been replaced with the less-powerful Bakorstanas.

Organized by the Jakarta chapter of the Corps of Alumni of the
Indonesian Moslem University Students Association, the one-day
seminar also featured political scholars Arbi Sanit, Deliar Noer
and Yusril Ihza Mahendra. (pan/imn)